At ten years of age, I was filled with excitement and curiosity, as my family sensed God leading us to take a step of faith into the new and unknown. That expressed itself as a signing up for Discipleship Training School with YWAM.

I had never met anyone from a different country before YWAM, so I was thrilled to interact with people from all over the world who came for DTS. I found myself particularly drawn by their accents and stories of their home countries.

I grew up in London; a city with a Church on every corner. At Christmas, schools in the area would rehearse and present the nativity story and at Easter, everyone knew it was about more than just chocolate, even if you didn’t believe. No matter where you went, anyone could tell you who the Christians were and provide a brief explanation of what they believed — always mentioning the name of “Jesus”.

In February 2016, I applied to do a Discipleship Training School here in Wollongong, Australia. English is not my first language but I grew up learning it in school. Some years ago I did short-term outreaches where the main language was English, but I never lived for six months in an English environment and I had never had a lecture in English. Even the word ‘lecture’ sounded weird, unfamiliar and complicated.

A few years ago on one of my bus rides to and from work, I found myself listening to podcasts. Despite the sometimes maddening and mundane routine, that combination of earbuds and spare time made out to be quite the precious duo. Little did I know that one of those podcasts would cycle back around in my life multiple times and serve as a reminder of a faith fundamental.